A new school year

Show gratitude to teachers each and every day

Updated 2:13 pm, Monday, August 25, 2014

Teacher Armando Orduna talks to students from HISD's Austin High School.

Teacher Armando Orduna talks to students from HISD's Austin High School.

A new school year

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The beginning of the school year should not only begin with high hopes for students. Let us also hope that parents and others will express gratitude to the professionals to whom we entrust our students, our future. Teachers return to school with long hours and - too often - little positive reinforcement.

Sometimes public school teachers can feel caught between the crossfire of parents who have not prepared their own children well and pundits who assume that most teachers lack competence. It was not always this way.

Experienced and novice teachers alike often deal with challenges of poverty over which they have no control. They may need to provide an adult authority figure for students who have none. Despite this, teachers are encouraged to teach from a script rather than to improvise in meeting the needs of individual students. They are told that their performance will be evaluated on high-stakes tests rather than whether they impart lifetime learning and problem-solving skills to their students.

Most teachers view their job as a calling and not just a means for a paycheck. Great teachers love children and have a profound influence that cannot be measured in dollars and cents or one annual multiple choice test. Incentive pay may motivate some, but for many the most valuable form of compensation is the gratitude of parents and civic leaders.

Words of appreciation - a note from parents - are important. Those words mean even more when accompanied by actions in Austin and at the district level to supply the resources commensurate with the importance of education.

Students flourish in an environment of high expectations coupled with encouragement. The same is true for teachers. Let's start the new school year right by remembering to express appreciation to our educators.